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In:Exploring and Exploiting Parallel Corpora of Spanish: The PaCorES corpus collection in language and translation education and research
Edited by Irene Doval and M. Teresa Sánchez Nieto
[Studies in Corpus Linguistics 129] 2026
► pp. 160–182

A practical example of using the PaEnS corpus in language teaching

The case of English prepositions

 | University of Santiago de Compostela
This content is being prepared for publication; it may be subject to changes.
Abstract
This chapter demonstrates how parallel corpora, specifically the English–Spanish Parallel Corpus (PaEnS), can support the teaching of English prepositions to Spanish-speaking English language learners. More specifically, the chapter addresses the different English translations of the Spanish preposition en and, conversely, the use of the English prepositions in, on, and at, which have no single equivalents in Spanish. Drawing on authentic corpus data, the study illustrates how real language examples enhance learners’ understanding of prepositional variation and usage. The findings suggest that corpus-based approaches provide richer and more effective input than traditional teaching materials, particularly in second-language instruction contexts.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.The study of English prepositions by Spanish-speaking students
    • 2.1The English prepositional system vs. the Spanish ‘list’ of prepositions
    • 2.2Main difficulties for Spanish-speaking students
  • 3.Searching PaEnS (Core Corpus) to learn about equivalences between English and Spanish prepositions
    • 3.1Search of Spanish generic prepositions: en
      • 3.1.1Spatial examples in the PaEnS core corpus
        • 3.1.1.1The spatial opposition in / on
        • 3.1.1.2The preposition at as a translation of en
        • 3.1.1.3En as equivalent to into
      • 3.1.2Temporal in / on variation
      • 3.1.3Spatial in/on variation in the same context with a single translation in Spanish as en
      • 3.1.4Other translations of en
    • 3.2Searching for specific English prepositions and their Spanish translations
      • 3.2.1Searching for at in PaEnS
      • 3.2.2The alternation of at with another preposition
  • 4.Conclusions
  • Notes
  • References
References (18)
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